12 LINKEDIN 3 COMMENTMORE

There are many definitions of liberalism and conservatism, but today’s distinguishing difference is that liberals believe in the scientific method for solving our nation’s problems. Conservatives believe their ideology Trumps science. Aside from global warming, the current major issue is the way liberals and conservatives value objectivity and the reporting of truth vs. fake news.

Greg Gianforte, the Republican candidate in Montana's special congressional election, body slammed a journalist to the floor and broke his glasses because he asked an embarrassing question. Despite later observer reports that Gianforte was in the wrong, some of his supporters blamed the reporter for the encounter because he was an aggressive liberal.

To cheering throngs of people, Donald Trump has routinely blamed the mainstream media — like CNN, The New York Times and The Washington Post — for being the purveyors of fake news. Letters to the editor of the Asheville Citizen-Times have charged it as being a member of the biased liberal news media. Unfortunately, many voters now feel they can justify their rejection of any descriptions of reality reported by our traditional sources of valid information.

This means that the late William Rusher, one of the major activists of today’s conservative movement, was successful beyond his fondest dreams. In the 1984 edition of his book “The Rise of the Right,” he bragged about the progress he and his colleagues had made in destroying America’s preference for liberal economic and social policies.

He explained, the conservative movement “…is equipped with the whole apparatus necessary for survival: think tanks, journals of opinion, legal foundations, a growing youth movement (Young Americans for Freedom), grass-roots organizations, political action committees, journalistic training centers, and schools for political candidates.”

In the words of Rusher, in the “…battles the conservative movement must fight and win… the media will be the battleground of the first, the academy will be the arena of the second.” In other words, a key part of their strategy was to discredit the mainstream media, and after that, the universities.

The racial turmoil and civil rights legislation of the 1960s made their task much easier. Southerners eagerly accepted the premise that their bad reputation and social problems were caused by, according to Gov. George Wallace, the “biased liberal news media” and “pointy-headed intellectuals.” The soundbites became popular even with many northern white workers who resented the increased black competition for well-paid jobs.

Regrettably, liberals were asleep at the switch during these crucial years. Instead of defending journalists and college professors, they tried to deny that they had a “liberal bias,” which actually is a devotion to the scientific method in preference to ideology. To further demonstrate how unbiased they were, news organizations and universities tried to “balance” their staffs with conservatives who were committed to an ideology.

Result: conservatives have been so successful that the two major political parties today are the Wall Street politicians vs. Main Street politicians. Almost all Republicans are Wall Street and most Democrats are Main Street. However an influential minority of Democrats have been conned into actually believing the absurdities of trickle-down economics, or don’t have the courage to tell it like it is and be attacked by a well-financed and strident opposition in their home districts. National policies favor a free market capitalism that has insufficient governmental economic and social policies to compensate for its weaknesses and its vulnerabilities to abuse.

We’ve repeated the kinds of policies that created the Great Depression and voters have to learn all over again about the kinds of economic and social policies that got us out of it. But it won’t happen if they choose to believe the simple fake news that fits their biases, instead of the complicated and nuanced truth.

Chuck Kelly lives in Fairview Forest and is author of “The Destructive Achiever; power and ethics in the American corporation” and “Farewell Fantasyland; time for political and economic reality.” He can be reached at kellycm2@bellsouth.net.

12 LINKEDIN 3 COMMENTMORE
Read or Share this story: http://avlne.ws/2t9F2VI